


What are you doing New Year's Eve?

by WatchforWitches



Category: Shadowhunters (TV), The Shadowhunter Chronicles - All Media Types
Genre: Gen, M/M, New Year's Eve, Second First Meetings, Sort Of, Time Travel
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-31
Updated: 2019-12-31
Packaged: 2021-02-27 10:13:23
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,234
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22045408
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/WatchforWitches/pseuds/WatchforWitches
Summary: Alec spends some of his New Year's Eve with Magnus, only it's 1919, and Magnus doesn't know who he is
Relationships: Magnus Bane/Alec Lightwood
Comments: 6
Kudos: 164





	What are you doing New Year's Eve?

**Author's Note:**

> Happy New Year's everyone, I hope you enjoy this fic! The title is named after the song of the same title, and the idea of time traveling was definitely inspired by my reading of Your Name for a Capitol by @theprophetlemonade which I urge everyone to read if you haven't already,it's beautiful and melancholy and just wow. 
> 
> I do hope you enjoy this short little fic!

Magnus was sure that the bubbles in the champagne glass he was holding were making him far loopier than he really was. Because he was sure that Will had just retired to a room off one of the grandiose hallways of the home they were in. And yet, he was standing not 15 feet in front of him. Or at least, a version of Will from several decades ago, a man in his early 30s or 40s. Magnus had thought it was him, but at a closer look, there were some small differences. This man was several inches taller than Will- still not as tall as Magnus himself but close enough- and his eyes were a deep hazel colour rather than Will’s our piercing blue. Magnus also noticed he was a shadowhunter, with a thick rune stretching a good portion of his neck. “Will?” He asks anyway, despite being fairly sure his eyes had straightened and it was not in fact the Herondale. 

“No,” the man looks taken aback by the comparison though, and it’s a look that rattles Magnus to his core, “No sorry.” 

“Well,” Magnus swallows, “You would be about 30 years younger than Will anyways, so I’m not sure what possessed me to assume so. My apologies.” 

“That’s alright,” The tall man replied. His voice was strange, clearly very american in a sea of Brits. Even Magnus held more of an accent than him, but Magnus found his accent to be undecipherable. He simply lived too many places to be tied to one. 

“What’s a shadowhunter doing at a warlock party?” Magnus posed the question then.

“Isn’t Will a shadowhunter?” The man replied back, quick as a whip. 

“Well,” Magnus supposed, “Yes, but he is a close personal friend of warlocks. Will is allowed.” 

The man tipped his head up to stare at the ceiling for several long moments before looking back down at Magnus and nodding. “That is fair I suppose. I’m also a close personal friend of some warlocks though.” 

Magnus tilted his head at this, raising his glass to his lips. “Is that so? Anyone I know?” 

The man smiled in a way that made Magnus’ heart skip. He was infernally handsome, for a shadowhunter boy, Magnus supposed it was probably just so. “Just the high warlock back where I am from.” 

“Aldous Nix if I am not mistaken? The high warlock of Manhattan? I take it you’re a New York man.” 

The man smiled another of his complicated smiles and nodded again, “You would be correct.” 

“Well,” Magnus swept an arm out across the sea of people in the ballroom, “Welcome to London.” 

“Thank you,” he tipped his head in thanks. His outfit was very peculiar, it looked to be almost entirely made of leather, at least the jacket was, he wore pants made entirely from a tight black denim. It was strange, but Magnus guessed that perhaps this is the normal attire of a New York shadowhunter.

The two talked for almost an hour, an easy back and forth built between them. Magnus had never met this man, but something in him felt inexplicably tied to him, they got on like they had been friends for years. They talked about everything from Peru to politics to the organization of the very party they were at. It almost felt like a spark of magic between them, but Magnus cold neither put a name to it or wish to. So few things were as easy to Magnus as the current conversation that he found himself engaged in. Whatever fight he had last had with Camille, whatever heartache he has felt at seeing Will aged and old, whatever stresses he had felt, all seemed like irrelevant background noise talking to this man. 

“You’re not here on business are you? I’m afraid that would be terrible for my image and I would have to banish you from my party.” He knew the look in the eyes of a shadowhunter roaring for a fight, and this man didn’t seem to have the same urgency, but he still asked.

“No,” he shook his head, “No I’m really afraid this is just some sort of dream that my husband will no doubt wake me from.”

“Husband?” Magnus asked in a hushed whisper. “Surely you know the legality of a man throwing terms like that around. I’m not judging you, we are more alike than I had thought in regards to that I suppose, just a fair warning. I don’t know what you can get away with in New York, but keep your voice down outside of these walls won’t you? I wouldn’t want you to be in trouble.” 

The man nodded solemnly, “Yes, of course, thank you for the precaution Magnus.” 

“I never told you my name,” Magnus remarks, “How do you know it?” 

The man was silent for a moment, “I apologize. I’ve heard of your legendary parties, and heard stories of your life for all of my own. I must feel like I know you better.” 

Magnus doesn’t reply to this but he takes a step closer to the man and feels a thin layer of magic reaching out from him like a shield. “You are covered in magic,” Magnus remarks, “Are you sure you’re a shadowhunter?” 

“Quite sure,” the man remarks.   
Magnus ignores the shiver that shoots through his spine at this. The magic the man possesses feels extremely famaliar. It almost feels like it could be his own, but it’s too big, it’s too warm. Magnus’ own magic was never that warm. The warmth was a parrallel of the warmth of the man’s eyes, he noted. He didn’t know why, but this man was inexplicably someone he knew, but he didn’t know how or why. 

Before Magnus could say anything further, he watched the man's eyes darted off to some corner of the room and stick there. When Magnus meets his gaze, he sees nothing nothing but a statue and a bookcase. “I’m sorry, but I must be going now actually. I hope you have an excellent New Year Magnus. May we meet again soon.”

The man is extremely bold, leaning up to press a quick kiss to Magnus’ cheek before running off. “Wait!” Magnus yells after him as he moves through the crowd. “I didn’t manage to catch your name!” 

“I didn’t throw it!” The man replies with a smile. 

Magnus wasn’t expecting the reply he got, so by the time his surprise fades, the man is gone into the crowd. 

He doesn’t see the strange shadowhunter again for the rest of the night, but his cheek tingles with something akin to magic for hours afterwards, even as Camille presses her cold lips to his as the clock strikes midnight, ringing in 1920, Magnus is still distraught from the encounter. 

He takes Camille’s hand instead, takes the drinks the servers offer him as the two move through the crowd together- the same crowd the tall man had seemingly vanished in. He figures it must have been some sort of strange magic, something that managed to get past his wards, something that someone had used to play a practical joke on him. Whatever the reason for the man's appearance, he figured it was something he couldn’t control, and relinquished himself to the rest of his party, only stopping to glance around for the shadowhunter several times more than necessary.

**Author's Note:**

> Kudos/Comments/ and Feedback are all greatly welcomed and appreciated!


End file.
